Augmented Reality: A Look At San Francisco's Past & Present

Rik Panganiban captured these shots of moden-day San Francisco overlapped with old images of San Francisco. The results are impressive. yes? But it's much more complicated than that -- at least to us, anyway. He explains:

I have been playing around with augmented reality apps lately, seeing how they might be used for education and civic engagement. The field is still in its beginning stages, but we are already starting to see some interesting applications of AR.

Of course, augmented reality applications have been around since the early 1990s. But it has only been until the past couple of years the consumer grade technology has gotten to the point that you can literally have an augmented reality experience using a device in your pocket. And with various AR standards (open and proprietary) already on the market, the potential for AR is still uncharted.

One of the best examples of the educational value of augmented reality is LookBack Maps.

Goodness, that sounds very smart! Anyway, the applications allows one to juxtapose old images with new ones via your smartphone. Panganiban did it. Here's how:

Once you are at the actual spot, you can call up a semi-transparent version of the historical photo, which is superimposed over the camera view of your phone. Trying to line up the photo with the actual view in front of you is not as easy as it sounds, particularly if it was taken from a strange angle or there are now buildings where an empty space once was. In a few cases I had to step out into the middle of an intersection and hope not to get hit by traffic as a I took a picture.